Knowledge Base

Set Up Ideation

  • Updated

Higher Logic Thrive Community (Thrive Community) offers the Ideation module to give you and your community users a convenient way to share ideas and suggestions about your community and its content.

As a Super Admin, you'll find that the various features of the Ideation module simplify the overall management of ideas — from idea submission right through to the implementation of those ideas.

NOTE: Ideation is not enabled by default in Thrive Community accounts. It is an optional module that Higher Logic enables in accounts that have licensed it.

This article details the Ideation set-up process which requires Admin actions in:

NOTE: After Ideation has been set up for your Thrive Community, it can also be enabled for individual communities within your main site, as described below in Enable Ideation for a Community.

Create and build the Ideation page

  1. In the Admin Toolbar, click (or right click for a new tab) Edit Navigation to access the Navigation page.

Toolbar-EditNavigation.png

  1. In the page tree structure, navigate to Main Button Bar > Participate.
  2. Click the ellipsis icon of the Participate page and select Add to add a page.

A New Page is added to the bottom of the Participate branch in the tree structure and it is selected.

  1. In the Page Properties panel that displays on the right side of the page, specify (at a minimum):

TIP: The following values are recommended. If you specify different values, be sure to note them somewhere because they will be needed later in this set-up process.

    • Navigation Title: Ideation
    • Page Code Name: ideation-home
    • URL Name: ideation-home
    • Syndication > Super Admins Only: check this box

CMS_Ideation_PgProps.png

  1. Scroll to the bottom of the Page Properties panel and click the Save button; then click the Edit button to open Page Designer.
  2. In the Widget section of the Build tab, type "ide" in the search field to refine the display of widgets.
  3. Click and drag the Ideation widget to the page and then click to select it.

PgDsgnr_Ideation-widget.png

  1. On the Properties panel:
    • Name or Title: Suggest Product Ideas

PgDsgnr_Ideation-widget_Properties.png

  1. At the bottom of the page, click the Publish button.

Create and build the Ideation Details page

  1. In the page tree structure, click the ellipsis icon of your new Ideation page and select Add to create a child page under it.
  2. In the Page Properties panel for the child page, specify:
    • Page Title: Ideation Details
    • Page Code Name: idea-details
    • Syndication > Super Admins Only: check this box
  1. Scroll to the bottom of the Page Properties panel and click the Save button; then click the Edit button to open Page Designer.
  2. In the Content section of the Build tab, click and drag the Syndicated Content widget to the page and then click the pencil icon to edit the widget as follows:
    • Syndicated from Site: The Current Site
    • Syndicated Page: Community Tabs (communitytabswithadmin)
    • Click Save.

Edit-Syndicated-Content_widget_CmmtyTabs.png

  1. In the Widget section of the Build tab, type "ide" in the search field to refine the display of widgets.
  2. Click and drag the Idea Details widget to the page and drop it under the Syndicated Content widget.

NOTE: This widget has one optional configuration parameter, Show Unique ID.

Each idea is assigned a unique ID that is used by the system and which, by default, does not display in your site. If you toggle ON this option, each idea's unique ID will display, but only on its respective Details page.

  1. Click and drag the Comments widget to the page and drop it under the Idea Details widget.
  2. Click the pencil icon to add the following parameters:
    • AddCommentButtonText="Add Comment"
    • IsAddCommentVisible="True"
    • ItemKeyParameter="IdeationKey"
    • Click Save.
  1. At the bottom of the page, click the Publish button.

Create the Community Ideas page

  1. In the page tree structure, navigate to Communities > Community Home.
  2. Click the ellipsis icon of the Community Home page and select Add to add a page.

A new page is added to the bottom of the current branch in the tree structure and it is selected.

Communities_CommunityHome_in-nav-tree.png

  1. In the Page Properties panel that displays on the right side of the page, specify:
    • Page Title: Ideas
    • Page Code Name: community-ideas
    • URL Name: community-ideas

NOTE: Above are recommended values that are required later in the setup process. If you provide alternative values for the title and page code, be sure to note them somewhere because they will be required later.

  1. Scroll to the bottom of the Page Properties panel and click the Publish button; then click the Edit button to open Page Designer.
  2. Add the following widgets to the page in the following top-to-bottom order:
    • Community Title
    • Syndicated Content (edit this widget and set Syndicated Page: Community Tabs (communitytabswithadmin), as was done in the previous section)
    • Ideation

Add the Ideas tab to the Community tabs

This section guides you through how to add a tab for your community-based Ideation page.

  • The Community tabs display across the top of each Community page, below the page title:

Cmmnty-tabs_example.png

  1. On a Community page, click (or right click for a new tab) Edit Navigation to access the Navigation page.
  2. In the page tree structure, navigate to Communities > Community Home > Community Tabs.
  3. Click the ellipsis icon of the Community Tabs page and select Edit to access Page Designer.
  4. Click the pencil icon to edit whichever Tabs widget you're using (Tabs with Blogs or Tabs without Blogs).

Cmmnty-tabs_edit-dialog.png

  1. On the editing dialog, click View parameters as text.

Cmmnty-tabs_edit_params-dialog.png

Tab position in the Community

The Ideas tab can be in any position you prefer on the community navigation bar, and what you specify in the parameters field determines that position. Typically, the Ideas tab is at position:

  • tab6 for the Tabs with Blogs widget and
  • tab5 for the Tabs without Blogs widget.

IMPORTANT: Make sure that you correctly re-assign numerical positions to the other tabs when necessary. For example, if you place the Ideas tab as tab6, the position of the existing tab6 and any tabs that follow it must be incremented accordingly (in this case, by 1).

Add the following parameter-value pairs to the parameters field.

TIP: Feel free to copy them from this page and paste them into the parameters field. If you type the parameter-value pairs into the parameters field, note the "casing" of the parameters; they are case sensitive.

IMPORTANT: The following "values" are recommended and were used in the examples in this article. If you provided different values during your setup, be sure to input those same values for these settings.

  • Tab6Name="Ideas"
  • Tab6NavigationCode="community-ideas"
  • Tab6StatProvider="Ideas"
  • Tab6ShowToPublic="true"

Enable Ideation for your Community Types

Ideation is now available for your Community Types.

  • The Ideation feature can be enabled for new and existing Community Types in the Features section of the Add Community Type and Edit Community Type dialogs.

Ideation_Cmmty-Type.png

Enable Ideation for a Community

Ideation is now available for your individual Communities.

  • The Ideation feature can be enabled for a new and an existing community in the Features section of a community's Community > Settings page.

Ideation_Cmmty-Settings.png

Manage Ideation settings in Admin

The final step is to enable a few settings to get your community site and your community users started with using Ideation.

  1. In the Admin interface, navigate to Feedback > Ideation > Settings.
  2. To get started, use the following settings.
    • Global Ideation Settings: customize these settings for your account
    • Ideation Home: set all of these permissions to Authenticated as a starting point
    • Community-Specific Ideas: leave the default settings

TIP: The Ideation Home and Community-Specific Ideas settings can be adjusted later as your Ideation experience develops and you gain a better understanding of the best level of engagement (e.g., submitting, voting, commenting) for your unique Ideation program.

All of the Ideation settings are described in detail in Ideation Settings.

  1. Click Save.

Ideation in your community site

Now that Ideation has been set up and enabled in your site and your select communities, there are several places where changes will be apparent.

Admin interface

The Ideation module will add several management pages in Admin.

  • Navigate to Feedback > Ideation to access them.

Ideation_pages-in-Admin.png

Be sure to visit the accompanying knowledge base articles.

Ideation home page

The Ideation home page will be new in your community site.

This is the centralized location for user engagement with ideas and suggestions. It's where all ideas-related conversations take place, and it provides feedback mechanisms (voting and commenting) with which community users can express their opinions of and thoughts on an idea.

Check out Ideation Home Page to learn:

  • how to filter the page display;
  • how to submit an idea;
  • how to manage ideas right on the page; and
  • which actions are available to community users and which are reserved for Admins.

Idea Details pages

The Ideation module will introduce new pages.

Every idea has a dedicated Details page on which all users can engage with the idea. The actions and options that are available depend on the user and their Ideation permissions.

For example:

  • all community users can Follow/Unfollow the idea and view the idea's comments.
  • only Admins and those who have Ideation-management permissions can mark a comment as the "Official Response."

All of the page options and permissions are described in the The Idea Details page section in Ideation home page.

Community Ideas page

The Ideation module will add an Ideas page in communities in which it is enabled. The URL of this page resembles:

https://<your_community>.connectedcommunity.org/communities/
community-home/community-ideas?communitykey=<your_community_key>

A community Ideas page mirrors the main site's Ideation home page (and its functionality and options) but it displays only those ideas that have been associated to that community.

Activity Feed (Thrive Community sites)

Ideation activities are added to your activities feed.

Ideas will populate the Activity Feed widget on the Member Home page of Thrive Community sites.

To learn about the Activity Feed, see Thrive Community Member Home Page.

On the Activity Feed cards for ideas, you can:

Idea_Activity-Feed_ellipsis-options.png

  • click the ellipsis icon to access the options,
  • view the number of comments that the idea has received,
  • vote on the idea, and
  • click the idea to jump to the idea's Details page.

If an idea is associated to a community, the community name displays on the idea's Activity Feed card and can be clicked to jump to that community's Ideas page.

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